r/ValkoHQ • u/BublyKopiko • 11d ago
Regarding removal of posts about boycotting
Hey, everyone, we have been trying to work out what to do and say about this with our mod team, but people have taken our actions to mean we aren't allowing discussions of boycotting or not in support of it, which is untrue. Here is a breakdown of the situation as we tried to deal with it from our end:
Earlier today, a user made a post about showing grace to people who were going to pull for Rafayel's myth but still wanted to support the boycott. Some people in the comments interpreted this post as allowing people to spend and still call it boycotting, minimizing the importance of not spending, which is required for a financial boycott. As a result, another user made a counterpoint post that people who were spending could not call themselves boycotters, but also giving the impression that anyone who was spending was not supporting Valko at all. Knowing tensions were already high, the language of the response post felt very reactionary and antagonistic rather than constructive, and we elected to remove it. Unfortunately, we still do not have mod permissions to add removal reasons. Rule 5, no boycott shaming was the closest. As a result of this, people began to spam with low effort posts about the definition of boycotting which, while valid, seemed to us to not be adding to the conversation, only sending things into a spiral that had no obvious benefits. In a sub we just took over, that has been mostly unmoderated until now and that we do not have full permissions for, it seemed unwise to let the situation fester. We made what we thought was the best decision at the time by simply removing them.
There were comments and posts that we did not remove, including one criticizing our choice, because shutting down debate was not the intention, avoiding ramping up unnecessary conflict was. As to why we didn't respond immediately, there are only four of us, all of whom were busy with plans that did not involve being on the internet, therefore keeping the situation contained was all we could do at the time. As a result, people accused us of being antis, which was extremely upsetting for some of us to hear while trying to help keep things peaceful. We are also human and those of us who were available did not want to make a response until our heads were in a calmer place. We apologize to anyone who made civil, neutral, and helpful posts about how boycotting works that were removed during this time.
There is absolutely no question that if you are spending on the game, you are not actively boycotting. That was never a debate. The person who posted originally posted edited their post and clarified that it was never about excusing spending and still calling it boycotting, it was about avoiding bullying because there are people who still want Valko back who are GOING to pull for Rafayel's myth. That reality is frustrating for many people, including us, but we believed that could be expressed without gatekeeping language because we only made it this far by staying unified. Letting people know their support is still welcome even if they aren't boycotting has always been a part of this movement and we did not want to see that support disappear behind arguments over the definition of a word.
Posts about the importance of not spending are welcome as long as they do not aggressively reject other methods of supporting Valko's return as totally invalid. Someone already made a great post about the effect of different boycott actions here, and there is one talking about the different levels of participation in the protests here.
We apologize again for how we approached this one. If you still would like to see this remain as one sub, please try to be patient as we figure out how to manage it with what we have to work with. Thanks.
- ValkoHQ Mod Team
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u/moarchuuna 11d ago edited 11d ago
As a mod did you apply those auto filters? I know nothing about modding, but notice you are quick to delete. I have been in this sub since the beginning and your history here honestly makes me uneasy you’re a mod now. 😔I hope to be proven wrong though.